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An Imperfect God

This is a version of an essay that appeared in The New York Times’ “The Stone”philosophy blog on November 25, 2012. The original article is available here.

Is God perfect? You often hear philosophers describe “theism” as the belief in a perfect being — a being whose attributes are said to include being all-powerful, all-knowing, immutable, perfectly good, perfectly simple, and necessarily existent (among others). And today, something like this view is common among lay people as well.

There are two famous problems with this view of God. The first is that it appears to be impossible to make it coherent. For example, it seems unlikely that God can be both perfectly powerful and perfectly good if the world is filled (as it obviously is) with instances of terrible injustice. Similarly, it’s hard to see how God can wield his infinite power to instigate alteration and change in all things if he is flat-out immutable. And there are more such contradictions where these came from.

The second problem is that while this “theist” view of God is supposed to be a description of the God of the Bible, it’s hard to find any evidence that the prophets and scholars who wrote the Hebrew Bible (or “Old Testament”) thought of God in this way at all. The God of Hebrew Scripture is not depicted as immutable, but repeatedly changes his mind about things (for example, he regrets having made man). He is not all-knowing, since he’s repeatedly surprised by things (like the Israelites abandoning him for a statue of a cow). He is not perfectly powerful either, in that he famously cannot control Israel and get this people to do what he wants. And so on.

Philosophers have spent many centuries trying to get God’s supposed perfections to fit together in a coherent conception, and then trying to get that to fit with the Bible. By now it’s reasonably clear that this can’t be done. In fact, part of the reason God-bashers like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris are so influential (apart from the fact they write so well) is their insistence that the doctrine of God’s perfections makes no sense, and that the idealized “being” it tells us about doesn’t resemble the biblical God at all.

So is that it, then? Have the atheists won? I don’t think so. But it does look like the time has come for some rethinking in the theist camp.

I’d start with this: Is it really necessary to say that God is a “perfect being,” or perfect at all, for that matter? As far as I can tell, the biblical authors avoid asserting any such thing. And with good reason. Normally, when we say that something is “perfect,” we mean it has attained the best possible balance among the principles involved in making it the kind of thing it is. For example, if we say that a bottle is perfect, we mean it can contain a significant quantity of liquid in its body; that its neck is long enough to be grasped comfortably and firmly; that the bore is wide enough to permit a rapid flow of liquid; and so on. Of course, you can always manufacture a bottle that will hold more liquid, but only by making the body too broad (so the bottle doesn’t handle well) or the neck too short (so it’s hard to hold). There’s an inevitable trade-off among the principles, and perfection lies in the balance among them. And this is so whether what’s being judged is a bottle or a horse, a wine or a gymnastics routine or natural human beauty.

What would we say if some philosopher told us that a perfect bottle would be one that can contain a perfectly great amount of liquid, while being perfectly easy to pour from at the same time? Or that a perfect horse would bear an infinitely heavy rider, while at the same time being able to run with perfectly great speed? I should think we’d say he’s made a fundamental mistake here: You can’t perfect something by maximizing all its constituent principles simultaneously. All this will get you is contradictions and absurdities. This is not less true of God than it is of anything else.

The attempt to think of God as a perfect being is misguided for another reason as well. We can speak of the perfection of a bottle or a horse because these are things that can be encompassed (at least in some sense) by our senses and understanding. Having the whole bottle before us, we feel we can judge how close it is to being a perfect instance of its type. But if asked to judge the perfection of a bottle poking out of a paper bag, or of a horse that’s partly hidden in the stable, we’d surely protest: How am I supposed to know? I can only see part of it.

Yet the biblical accounts of our encounters with God emphasize that all human views of God are partial and fragmentary in just this way. Even Moses, the greatest of the prophets, is told that he can’t see God’s face, but can only catch a glimpse of God’s back as he passes by. At another point, God responds to Moses’ request to know his name (that is, his nature) by telling him “ehi’eh asher ehi’eh” — “I will be what I will be.” In most English-language Bibles this is translated “I am that I am,” following the Septuagint, which sought to bring the biblical text into line with the Greek tradition (descended from Xenophanes, Parmenides and Plato’s “Timaeus”) of identifying God with perfect being. But in the Hebrew original, the text says almost exactly the opposite of this: The Hebrew “I will be what I will be” is in the imperfect tense, suggesting to us a God who is incomplete and changing. In their run-ins with God, human beings can glimpse a corner or an edge of something too immense to be encompassed, a “coming-into-being” as God approaches, and no more. The belief that any human mind can grasp enough of God to begin recognizing perfections in him would have struck the biblical authors as a pagan conceit.

So if it’s not a bundle of “perfections” that the prophets and scholars who wrote the Hebrew Bible referred to in speaking of God, what was it they were talking about? As Donald Harman Akenson writes, the God of Hebrew Scripture is meant to be an “embodiment of what is, of reality” as we experience it. God’s abrupt shifts from action to seeming indifference and back, his changing demands from the human beings standing before him, his at-times devastating responses to mankind’s deeds and misdeeds — all these reflect the hardship so often present in the lives of most human beings. To be sure, the biblical God can appear with sudden and stunning generosity as well, as he did to Israel at the Red Sea. And he is portrayed, ultimately, as faithful and just. But these are not the “perfections” of a God known to be a perfect being. They don’t exist in his character “necessarily,” or anything remotely similar to this. On the contrary, it is the hope that God is faithful and just that is the subject of ancient Israel’s faith: We hope that despite the frequently harsh reality of our daily experience, there is nonetheless a faithfulness and justice that rules in our world in the end.

The ancient Israelites, in other words, discovered a more realistic God than that descended from the tradition of Greek thought. But philosophers have tended to steer clear of such a view, no doubt out of fear that an imperfect God would not attract mankind’s allegiance. Instead, they have preferred to speak to us of a God consisting of a series of sweeping idealizations — idealizations whose relation to the world in which we actually live is scarcely imaginable. Today, with theism rapidly losing ground across Europe and among Americans as well, we could stand to reconsider this point. Surely a more plausible conception of God couldn’t hurt.

For more information about The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture (Cambridge University Press, August 28, 2012) gohere.To pre-order the book, click here.To subscribe to follow the book by email, clickhere.

[b](Taken from rabbi Breitowitz weekly news letter in Toronto Canada)[/b] A recent guest submission by Yoram Hazony, president of the Institute for Advanced Studies at the Shalem Center in Yerushalayim, calls for comment. As it casts doubt on the most cherished theological principles of Torah Judaism without a scrap of justification, it must be countered so not to lead the unwitting astray by the elegance of its literary style. (The italicized paragraphs are from the Hazony article; the responses are in regular typeface.)Is God perfect? You often hear philosophers describe “theism” as the belief in a perfect being — a being whose attributes are said to include being all-powerful, all-knowing, immutable, perfectly good, perfectly simple, and necessarily existent (among others). And today, something like this view is common among lay people as well.There are two famous problems with this view of God. The first is that it appears to be impossible to make it coherent. For example, it seems unlikely that God can be both perfectly powerful and perfectly good if the world is filled (as it obviously is) with instances of terrible injustice.The problem of theodicy – justification of Divine judgement – has been discussed for hundreds of years. According to the Talmud (Berachos 7a), Moshe Rabbeinu himself asked Hashem to provide an explanation of these issues. The Biblical book of Iyov is, according to the commentaries of Rambam in the Moreh Nevuchim, Ramban, Malbim and others, a comprehensive treatment of this subject from many perspectives.The starting point for any discussion, however, is the Biblical verse (Devarim 32:4-5): “The deeds of the Rock are perfect, for all His ways are just; a trustworthy God, without injustice, He is righteous and upright. Corruption is not His; it is His children's defect, you crooked and twisted generation.”To assume, as Hazony does further in the article, that the Bible embraces a view of an imperfect deity and thus can accept the possibility – let alone the certainty – of “terrible injustice” is clearly absurd.Similarly, it’s hard to see how God can wield his infinite power to instigate alteration and change in all things if he is flat-out immutable. It is hard to believe that any serious philosopher would roll out this chestnut in the twenty-first century. This argument is rooted in an Aristotlean conception of the Deity whose acts follow of necessity from His essential nature. Thus, if His essence is unchanging, his works (i.e. the created world) should be unchanging. The Rambam has already noted (Moreh Nevuchim 2:25) that the Aristotelian view runs counter to the belief in miracles. But Judaism has never accepted this conception.And there are more such contradictions where these came from.Should we take Hazony’s word on this? Presumably he has chosen his best arguments for presentation. The ones he expects us to accept on faith cannot be better!The second problem is that while this “theist” view of God is supposed to be a description of the God of the Bible, it’s hard to find any evidence that the prophets and scholars who wrote the Hebrew Bible (or “Old Testament”) thought of God in this way at all. The God of Hebrew Scripture is not depicted as immutable, but repeatedly changes his mind about things (for example, he regrets having made man).But the Bible itself says (Bamidbar 23:19), “G-d is not a man that He should lie, nor is He a mortal that He should change His mind. Would He say and not do, speak and not fulfill?” Obviously, the use of the term “regret” in relation to G-d (Bereishis 6:7; Shemos 32:14; Shmuel I 15:11; Shmuel II 24:17) is merely a metaphor for a change in action in response to new conditions. (See Abarbanel, Bereishis 6:5 for an elaboration of this idea.)He is not all-knowing, since he’s repeatedly surprised by things (like the Israelites abandoning him for a statue of a cow). Look up the story at Shemos Chapter 32. There is absolutely no indication in the text that Hashem was caught off guard by the Jews’ worship of the Golden Calf.He is not perfectly powerful either, in that he famously cannot control Israel and get its people to do what he wants. This is sheer nonsense. G-d wants man to choose good and reject evil of his own volition, as the verse states (Devarim 30:19), “This day, I call upon the heaven and the earth as witnesses [that I have warned] you: I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. You shall choose life, so that you and your offspring will live.” His nonintervention in our choices is not a contradiction to His omnipotence. (As to why our commission of evil is referred to as a violation of His will, see Rambam, Shemoneh Perakim Chapter 8.)And so on.We have already commented above on the undisclosed proofs.Philosophers have spent many centuries trying to get God’s supposed perfections to fit together in a coherent conception, and then trying to get that to fit with the Bible. By now it’s reasonably clear that this can’t be done.There is nothing in Hazony’s presentation that makes this clear at all. In fact, there is nothing that even challenges the traditional conception of G-d.In fact, part of the reason God-bashers like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris are so influential (apart from the fact they write so well) is their insistence that the doctrine of God’s perfections makes no sense, and that the idealized “being” it tells us about doesn’t resemble the biblical God at all.The reason they are so influential is because they are writing for the uninformed masses. But the claim that Dawkins and Harris have made the argument that the idealized being does not resemble the biblical Gd leaves me scratching my head. They are not proving their claims from the Bible and they are not embracing a new conception of an imperfect G-d. They are unabashed atheists.So is that it, then? Have the atheists won? I don’t think so. But it does look like the time has come for some rethinking in the theist camp.This is true. The time has come for some rethinking in the theist camp. But the question to be asked is not Hazony’s. Rather we should be asking the following: Why are we – as Jews – so unfamiliar with our own Torah, heritage, and philosophy that we should take articles such as this seriously?

paul schneider

November 27, 2012

none

There are two points. The first is that the word "perfection" appears in Anselm's ontological argument as a central premise in one argument and a conclusion in another version. His claim: Somethig is more perfect if it exists than if it doesn't exist. Would Santa be more perfect if he existed? Is there a context where that would make sense to an adult? In actual use we say a perfect baseball game is when one team has no offense at all. That meaning appartently contrast with Anselm, for him a perfect player would hit a homerun every time at bat and destroy he game. Actually I have no idea what he would mean. There are probably few examples where perfection is contrasted with existence in just the right way to make the premiss understable but I doubt it. In the end, one can conclude perhaps that the correct contrast has only to do with one thing: God. God is more perfect if h really exists rather exists only in our minds.That caveat makes the argument either circular or more accurately simply not intelligible.

The second point is one you are corect about but a little disingenuous. You cite the Hebrew bible as having example after example where God is not perfect, according to whatever you think 'perfect' is in a particular case. I'd say most Jews if they wory about the Ontological Argument at all, are doing so as an academic exercise. It was a Medieval Christian game to worry about 'evil' and 'free will' and such. The only place I see any theology done in the Hebrew Bible was in the Book of Job. To me God is fairly specific there: He says it's none of our business. This leads to the conclusion that the definitional problems that rise in theology are Christian issues. Jews have enough headaches without theology!

S E

November 26, 2012

None

What of הצור תמים פעלו, and any number similar verses? Surely such formations should mitigate your generalization about biblical authors assertions regarding God's perfection. And really, as you point out, God is so far removed from us that we can not grasp his nature. Why not just go with Y. Leibovitz on this one?

ploni almoni

November 26, 2012

none

i had a grandchild born (#33) about 10 days ago that had oxygen deprivation for a few minutes. he is currently in the nicu unit. i'd like to be an optiist and say that his lack of response to my poking his eye is due to the effect of anti-convulsive meds that he is being weaned from. i was devasteted last week because i was negotiating with god (i'm agnostic) but getting nowhere (surprise surprise). when i came to my senses and concluded that god's existance is not relevant since he/she/it does not exist or just is not involved i was able to think clearly and be more supportive of my son and daughter in law (charaidi+). the important question is not whether god (whaever that means) exists but whether god cares. it seems not. religion (any) is an attempt to deny that simple (and clear) reality.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

i posted the above yesterday somewhere else.i bought and started reading your book a few weeks ago in the hope that i would discover a "god" that would be relevant to my life as opposed to god's non existance or irrelivance. unfortunately i haven't exprianced god's "sudden and stunning generousity". it would be very welcome right now, but i'm not holding my breathe.it's had for me to state with any certainty that god (however we define it) does or doesn't exist but god's hester panim makes him/her/it irrelevant.

Dallas Bell

November 26, 2012

SystematicPoliticalScience

It seems there may be a weak theological strategy to the "zeitgeist argument." To induce from one interpretation of Torah/Tanach to the characteristics of the Creator without being supported by, even being hostile to, deduction from the Creator's characteristics to guide the interpretation of the Torah/Tanach is a widely recognized debate fallacy. In this case, we may use math tools to analyze cosmological options. When a study of infiniteness is made regarding time, the notion of infinite regress looks at the impossibility of the present occurring in a secession of moments as it does in the linear time/space of our (entropy) material universe. The other option is that something came from nothing which is expressed as 0 > 0 and is a violation of math/physics principles called atheist math. Both of those realities indicate that the Creator is outside of time and thus must have always existed in infiniteness. That means He embodies infiniteness and is therefore infinite. This also means He chose a specific point to create our universe and start time's secession of moments. Having made a choice indicates discrimination of options and the characteristic of intellect etc. Intellect has love, justice, and mercy etc. If the Creator is infinite, as just briefly demonstrated, His characteristics are also infinite. Infiniteness includes all possible options simultaneously. Then infiniteness means perfection in all characteristics as they are employed with wisdom at all times. Rational deduction leads to the necessity of an infinite and perfect Creator. Does the Torah/Tanach really describe a lesser god? Perhaps a look at I Kings 8:27, Psalms 89:14, 117:2, 139:7-12, Isaiah 40:13-25, 28, 48:3-5, 57:15, Jeremiah 32:17 etc. will mitigate the passages in Deuteronomy 32:22, 34-41, Psalms 5:5-6 etc. for an unbiased analysis. This brings up the last consideration--epistemology. Human neuroscience studies how the brain's cells act as logic gates in a computer. For the circumstances of a rational decision to be made, a partition congruence of past input and decisions is reached. In a nutshell, interpretation of Scripture is based on prior decisions and will lead to either the conclusion that the Creator is perfect or is not perfect. If the Creator is not perfect then His character is not impugned or hurt by this recognition. However, if the Creator is perfect, as induction and deduction indicate, then His holiness is indeed impugned by unjust comparison to a lesser god.

Yehoshua Derovan

November 26, 2012

Bar-Ilan university

Thank you very much for the insightful idea.I think Rav Shimshon Rephael Hirsch has written similiarly in his Torah commentary: